PAKISTAN
Mob attacks temple, school
A crowd ransacked a school and Hindu temple after a Hindu principal was accused of blasphemy, police said yesterday. The violence erupted in the southern province of Sindh after a student accused the Hindu principal of blasphemy in comments about the Muslim Prophet Mohammed. The enraged crowd ransacked the school and damaged a nearby temple, a district police chief said. The principal had been taken into protective custody and police were investigating the alleged blasphemy and the rioters, he added. “It seems the principal had not done anything intentionally,” district police chief Furrukh Ali said.
INDIA
Angry bees delay flight
An Air India flight on Sunday was delayed by three-and-a-half hours after a swarm of bees landed on the cockpit window, officials said. The insects landed on the window just before the plane was due to leave Kolkata for Agartala with 136 passengers, including Bangladesh’s information minister. Ground staff tried to shoo the insects off, angering them, and when attempts to use the windscreen wipers failed, officials switched to “Plan B” and blasted them off with water. “Fire tenders were deployed to spray water to dislodge the honey bees and they could be driven away after nearly an hour-long operation,” airport official Kaushik Bhattcharya said.
JAPAN
Outage hits 80,000 homes
About 78,700 households were still without power in Chiba after a powerful typhoon battered the east, Tokyo Electric spokesman Naoya Kondo said yesterday. Typhoon Faxai powered into the Tokyo region in the early hours of Monday last week, packing record winds that brought down power lines and prompted the government to order tens of thousands of people to leave their homes. The storm killed two people and at least three elderly people later died due to heatstroke as temperatures soared above 35°C in areas affected by a post-typhoon blackout. The national weather agency yesterday issued new warnings for heavy rain in Chiba, while local authorities issued non-compulsory evacuation orders to 46,300 people due to the risk of landslides.
SPAIN
Court rejects extradition
The High Court yesterday ruled that the government should refuse a request from the US that it extradite Venezuela’s former military intelligence chief. Former general Hugo Carvajal was arrested on drug trafficking charges by Spanish police in April at the request of Washington, which believes he would share incriminating information about Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. Carvajal, an ally of former Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez, has turned against Maduro.
SOUTH KOREA
Eatery removes Kim images
You can sell North Korean food in South Korea, but you will get into trouble if you decorate your restaurant with something deemed praising Pyongyang. Authorities said the owner of a Seoul restaurant under construction yesterday removed signs with the portrait of North Korean leaders and the image of a North Korean flag from the restaurant’s exterior wall. The restaurant had been criticized over the weekend after local media published those signs. Police said they are investigating if the owner breached security laws that punish an act of praising North Korea with up to seven years in prison. The owner said that the North Korea-themed exterior decoration would draw more attention and help him make profits.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
RIVER TRAGEDY: Local fishers and residents helped rescue people after the vessel capsized, while motorbike taxis evacuated some of the injured At least 58 people going to a funeral died after their overloaded river boat capsized in the Central African Republic’s (CAR) capital, Bangui, the head of civil protection said on Saturday. “We were able to extract 58 lifeless bodies,” Thomas Djimasse told Radio Guira. “We don’t know the total number of people who are underwater. According to witnesses and videos on social media, the wooden boat was carrying more than 300 people — some standing and others perched on wooden structures — when it sank on the Mpoko River on Friday. The vessel was heading to the funeral of a village chief in